Sorcerer spell picks.

I am currently playing as a sorceress and almost every time I level up I spend hours trying to figure out what to pick for my new spells. So I would like to bounce some ideas off of the community to see what they think. If anyone else wants to talk about their spell pick ideas, feel free to do so.

I have 2 slots I am unsure what to do with; one at level 3 and one at level 4.

For level 3 I am thinking either Mestil's Acid Breath or Negative Energy Burst. I don't really need Haste since I have an item that does that for me. Acid Breath would mainly be for beating damage resistances. Negative Burst would be an option for damaging and weakening instead of just damaging, but I am not sure it is worthwhile yet.

For level 4 I am stuck between Evard's Black Tentacles and Ice Storm. Tentacles has always helped me a lot in the past, I am concerned that it can't hit some things, like small creatures or creatures with damage reduction. Ice Storm is a pretty straightforward spell, but I have other AoE spells too.

is scorching ray in NWN 1? if so, it's a great level two spell and an awesome option for level 4 when using the empower feat, but i guess if your level 2 is already used up then that is no dice ( just realized this is a sorcerer and not a mage haha )

and there is another level 4 damaging spell, issac's missile storm i think it is called? not sure if it's in NWN 1 but that is a pretty decent level 4 spell

don't know if anything i say is helping, i never used an arcane caster in NWN 1, and all my XP comes from NWN 2

There is no scorching ray in NWN1. Issac's Lesser Missile Storm is an option for level 4 I guess, but I don't like it as much as the other options. Based on its description, it is pretty bad at crowd control and is about as effective as Ice Storm when used on a single target, but Ice Storm is also very good at crowd control so that seems like a better pick.

Another small question: Which do people prefer; Fireball or Scintillating Sphere? They appear to be effectively the same spell, except that Fireball has a longer range and does fire damage while Scintillating Sphere does lightning damage.

Depends on the specific campaign. Also the henchmen you have with and your familiar might influence the decision to take the summon creature spells. If you need more tanking power in your group, they're great, make the second spell you learn each level the summon creature spell, and then unlearn the summon creature spell from the previous level (not sure if you noticed, but on level up you can unlearn spells and replace them with new ones). If you've got a tough familiar and a tanky henchmen already that may not bring much to the table, though.

Don't underestimate protection from evil, since it makes you immune to a ton of mind based affects from evil creatures, and it's a level 1 spell! I'd swap out grease for that one. If you're sitting back in fights, you can cast it on your tank, so they don't get stunned.

Maybe change out flame weapon for ghostly visage. The concealment bonus is sweet for a level 2 spell, and lasts for a long time once you get some levels.

Ice Storm's nice if you need to fight a lot of rogues with high reflex saves (since there's no save for it), so once again, depends on the campaign.

@DrHappyAngry Well, the thing is, I am kinda fussy about getting as much XP as possible for my kills so I am going solo, more or less. My familiar is the eyeball and I rarely summon him for the above reason. I could always change my familiar I guess, but I would need a recommendation. The campaign is the OC. Ghostly Visage Is not really needed since I have the Adventurer's Robe which gives me the same damage reduction, Shield which gives me immunity to Magic Missile (the only level 1 spell I really fear), and to top it off I have a Rod of the Ghost which can cast the spell for me anyway. I thought about Protection from Alignment, but I would somewhat prefer a more reliable mind spell immunity.

It is too bad that some of the best protection items compete with my charisma boosting equipment slots. Cloak of Movement competes with Nymph Cloak. Golden Circlet competes with Mask of Persuasion.

Anyway, I decided to take Negative Burst and Black Tentacles a while ago since, theoretically, they could work together to make the tentacles more likely to hit. I will likely want to bounce more ideas off of people at my next level up (level 5 spells!) so keep suggesting stuff and I will keep looking in on this thread.

In the mean time I have a puzzle for everyone: What would you pick for your three level 9 spells? I like quite a few of them, but I never seem to have room for all I want. Of the level 9 spells the ones I always want are:

Bigby's Crushing Hand: Disables most anything while doing damage.

Black Blade of Disaster: An invincible summon with a weapon enhancement bonus equal to my charisma modifier and save or die on hit? What is not to like?

Mordenkainen's Disjunction: The only dispel that ever works at high levels.

That is true, summons and familiars cut into your XP. If you wanted a familiar that could fight for you, the Panther's pretty sweet, 3 attacks/round and sneak attacks. The Pixie is cool, too. It's worthless in a fight, but you can just summon it to deal with traps and locks, then get rid of it. Not like the OC gives XP for locks and traps anyways.

If you're cool with items covering spells, that works too. Ghostly Visage might be something you want to swap in later over a spell that's become obsolete at higher levels. Eventually after getting enough levels, when you cast it, it'll last a lot longer than rod of the ghost. You may also want to use a different robe later on, too. But don't sweat it, if it's working for you. Just one of my faves, and stays good through the whole game.

It has been forever since I played a caster in nwn to high enough level to cast level 9 spells, but I seem to remember taking the ones you mentioned, although most toughter enemies will just make their save against wail of the banshee.

Level 10 came and passed without much head scratching on my part. I figured I didn't need Cone of Cold yet since it did no more damage than Scintillating Sphere (which I could now empower). I figured I didn't need Mestil's Acid Sheath yet (plus I didn't want to take it until I also took the other damage shield spells). The choice was then between Hold Monster and Energy Buffer. I figured I would likely not run into many casters until my next level up so I took Hold Monster, which is my first long lasting disabling spell anyway. I also switched my familiar to Pixie so I could handle traps and locks.

I recommend that you play at first with a Wizard and use a Sorcerer in second playthrough, that way you can "experiment" before play , but my spell recommendations are :

TIER 1

Identify - Invaluable for using items as soon as you pick them up, or in a low income environment.Magic missile - A decent finisher that will save you the use of higher level spell. Also, one of the few spells that does magical damage.Protection from alignment - The bonuses are almost too good to pass up. +2 to Armor (Deflection), +2 to all saves vs. Alignment, and Immunity to mind spells vs. Alignment. All in a level 1 spell!TIER 2

Invisibility - A general all-purpose hiding spell. Useful for "refreshing" improved invisibility, while leaving the higher spell slot available.Knock - Who needs a rogue when you have this spell? Only works on locks not flagged as "Plot."Melf's acid arrow - One of the only Level 2 direct damage spells, it's a nice opener against a tough target. The duration stacks all the way to Level 39, with damage being dealt over 13 rounds. Anything over 6 Acid Resist completely prevents all but the initial damage.Ultravision/see invisibility - Both very useful to detect hidden entities (invisible or hiding in darkness).

TIER 3

Displacement - 50% miss chance from melee/ranged attacks.Flame arrow - 4d6 fire damage per arrow; spell resistance check for each arrow; one arrow per four levels. This spell is amazing at end game mainly with metamagic. Fireball if you are not in "core dnd rules", since you will damage your companions

Black Blade of Disaster: An invincible summon with a weapon enhancement bonus equal to my charisma modifier and save or die on hit? What is not to like?

(...)

Wail of the Banshee: Kill everyone instantly sounds good to me.

Time Stop: Need I explain?

Black Blade of Disaster, i can't recommend since you need to "concentrate" and in Hotu BBD will probably not OHK very often. Wail of the Banshee, is good to kill mid to low tier monsters, but high tier monsters tends to resist.

Black Blade of Disaster: An invincible summon with a weapon enhancement bonus equal to my charisma modifier and save or die on hit? What is not to like?

(...)

Wail of the Banshee: Kill everyone instantly sounds good to me.

Time Stop: Need I explain?

Black Blade of Disaster, i can't recommend since you need to "concentrate" and in Hotu BBD will probably not OHK very often. Wail of the Banshee, is good to kill mid to low tier monsters, but high tier monsters tends to resist.

Yeah, I suppose that is true about Banshee, but I have my own little way of dealing with the Black Blade.

Up to level 12 now. I almost went with Chain Lightning until I remembered that its secondary damage is half the primary damage and not 10d6 from the start. I will probably take it eventually, but for now I went with Flesh to Stone since very few things are immune to it. Next pick for level 6 spells will most likely be Isaac's Greater Missile Storm, but for now I figure I can just empower/maximize spells if I want better enemy blasters. I like to have my disabling spells come with a variety of save types and forms so I can target whatever my current enemy's lowest save is. Enemies with weak fortitude usually get hit with Flesh to Stone or a death spell (Finger or Banshee). Enemies with weak will usually get hit with Hold Monster. Enemies with weak reflex usually get hit with Sunburst. Then Bigby's Crushing Hand can usually disable anything.

hehe i love sorc. it's the most powerful caster in the game, whereas wizard is more of a thinking man's caster.

i love how nwn really captured the mythos of sorc as an ultimate power build, with the correct fantasy elements of being powerful, yet also weak. a bit like the sorceror in the movie "Sword of the Sorceror"? Spectacular power, but once you figure out a sorc's weakness, you can kill them lol.

so in truth a wizard in some ways is the most powerful caster, since once he figures out your weakness, the wizard is the deadliest caster in the game (since he can swap aruond spells).

um... imho spell selection for sorc really depends on what kind of realm you are playing in. a given selection of set of spells can make sorc supreme in one realm, yet make him or her quite weak in another.

in continuous team pvp, a sorc tends to be better because you do not really have time to fiddle through your spell selections like a wizard would. the ability to just keep pumping out high damage spells still tends to win the match.

in some mods or realms, some spell selections are just very good --- this is why i think nwn really is still the best caster mmo out there. like a real magic user, every caster in nwn really needs to read and know the grimoire, or the spell magic of their world. so you really need to study your spell book, know each spell, and know each spells strengths and weaknesses (and bugs too....).

umm.. i do have a favourite list of sorc spells for each team pvp server. but it does tend to change from server to server.

for example -- a necro spell focussed sorc is really deadly and can insta kill many things. but many pvp servers disable insta death or give players immunity to death items. however, some rpg servers dont have many undead or dont give out immunity to death, so then it can be fun to focus on necro school and try to one shot all the creatures/players (if it is open pvp) in the realm. yo can really strike fear everywhere, until the server's GM decide to change the rules -.-

then again casters can be hilarious in rp servers. if you did somehow make a high DC Tashas hideous laughter spell caster, and maybe casted it on low level players, you could have a fun time leaving every player or npc etc in fits of lughter then just walk away . nwn is the ONLY mmo which lets you have fun times like this.

Up to level 12 now. I almost went with Chain Lightning until I remembered that its secondary damage is half the primary damage and not 10d6 from the start. I will probably take it eventually, but for now I went with Flesh to Stone since very few things are immune to it. Next pick for level 6 spells will most likely be Isaac's Greater Missile Storm, but for now I figure I can just empower/maximize spells if I want better enemy blasters. I like to have my disabling spells come with a variety of save types and forms so I can target whatever my current enemy's lowest save is. Enemies with weak fortitude usually get hit with Flesh to Stone or a death spell (Finger or Banshee). Enemies with weak will usually get hit with Hold Monster. Enemies with weak reflex usually get hit with Sunburst. Then Bigby's Crushing Hand can usually disable anything.

Isaac's Greater Missile Storm is simple the best DPS spell in game(against single enemies). At lv 20, will do 40-240 damage(CL = 20 * 2d6 ), now add maximize and empower metamagic... Even without metamagic, his damage is what is expected from Epic spells like Hellball and this spell won't allow save for half damage like many other spells.

Spell selection dilemma? Don't worry, a fellow Sorcerer is to your assistance! Well then, take a look at my Sorcerer Spellbook. First I'll give the Final spell selections for my level 20 sorcerer, and then what spells to take in the meantime till you get access to the required high level spells. So here you go:

Level 0:

All

Level 1:

Protection from Alignment (Best thing is that makes you immune to all mind affecting spells from a particular alignment)

Magic Missile (Besides being a good offense spell, it can also break locked chests and probably doors which are flagged as non-plot, so Knock is basically useless)

Level 8:

Level 9:

Time Stop (obvious choice)

Mordenkainen's Disjunction (Take this and forget other lower level spells of it's line)

Wail of the Banshee / Weird (take any, both are for mass annihilation)

Well now, these are the final spell picks. In the meantime you need some improvisational substitutes. Mainly, you need some defensive substitutes like: Stoneskin, lesser Elemental resistance spells; some dispelling and breaching spells; some insta-kill spells (Circle of Death, Finger of Death, though they later become completely useless); and some summons (as you like, but I'd prefer not to take any other than those I mentioned in the Final selection). Other than that, it depends upon the situation and your playstyle, and most importantly, if you have already got any magic items which give the same effect as any of the spells thus making the latter redundant. Also, I don't prefer Hold-type spells due to their sheer unreliability, and you can faster kill something in this game than disable them.

And yes, I'd recommend taking a single level of Paladin with your Sorcerer, if you haven't done it already. It's like cream on top of a chocolate cake.

So, that's it! Hope it helps you and any other Sorcerers who are in the dilemma of Arcane Spell Selection!

Up to level 12 now. I almost went with Chain Lightning until I remembered that its secondary damage is half the primary damage and not 10d6 from the start. I will probably take it eventually, but for now I went with Flesh to Stone since very few things are immune to it. Next pick for level 6 spells will most likely be Isaac's Greater Missile Storm, but for now I figure I can just empower/maximize spells if I want better enemy blasters. I like to have my disabling spells come with a variety of save types and forms so I can target whatever my current enemy's lowest save is. Enemies with weak fortitude usually get hit with Flesh to Stone or a death spell (Finger or Banshee). Enemies with weak will usually get hit with Hold Monster. Enemies with weak reflex usually get hit with Sunburst. Then Bigby's Crushing Hand can usually disable anything.

Isaac's Greater Missile Storm is simple the best DPS spell in game(against single enemies). At lv 20, will do 40-240 damage(CL = 20 * 2d6 ), now add maximize and empower metamagic... Even without metamagic, his damage is what is expected from Epic spells like Hellball and this spell won't allow save for half damage like many other spells.

It certainly works well on a single or couple targets, but as far as crowd control goes it is only ok.

Up to level 12 now. I almost went with Chain Lightning until I remembered that its secondary damage is half the primary damage and not 10d6 from the start. I will probably take it eventually, but for now I went with Flesh to Stone since very few things are immune to it. Next pick for level 6 spells will most likely be Isaac's Greater Missile Storm, but for now I figure I can just empower/maximize spells if I want better enemy blasters. I like to have my disabling spells come with a variety of save types and forms so I can target whatever my current enemy's lowest save is. Enemies with weak fortitude usually get hit with Flesh to Stone or a death spell (Finger or Banshee). Enemies with weak will usually get hit with Hold Monster. Enemies with weak reflex usually get hit with Sunburst. Then Bigby's Crushing Hand can usually disable anything.

Isaac's Greater Missile Storm is simple the best DPS spell in game(against single enemies). At lv 20, will do 40-240 damage(CL = 20 * 2d6 ), now add maximize and empower metamagic... Even without metamagic, his damage is what is expected from Epic spells like Hellball and this spell won't allow save for half damage like many other spells.

It certainly works well on a single or couple targets, but as far as crowd control goes it is only ok.

Yes, it's actually supposed to eliminate one target with surety than just injure many targets so that they are still alive. Use it only on high priority targets. And yes, on those rogues with Evasion who dodge your maximized fireballs.

Reached level 15 recently. I decided to get rid of Grease for True Strike. I never really used Grease, but I don't think I will use True Strike much either. Actually, I don't use a few of my level 1 spells very much. I mainly just use Shield and Magic Missile. Also Identify sometimes. I still have Color Spray even though I don't use that much either. I mostly like to keep it because it is pretty to cast... I kinda like grease as a last resort spell to disable things immune to everything else by knocking them down. I don't use Cloud of Bewilderment much anymore either, but I still like it to disable things immune to everything else by blinding them.

Anyway, I took Firebrand at an earlier level. It has been useful so far, but I plan to replace it with Cone of Cold once I get Delayed Blast Fireball. I also added Lesser Mind Blank because I would have to take off my charisma boosting Mask of Persuasion to get mind spell immunity otherwise and there was little else I wanted that I didn't already have. At level 6 I added Greater Stoneskin for the time being. I will replace it once I get Premonition, probably with Chain Lightning. I added Isaac's Greater Missile Storm at an earlier level, of course. For level 7 I have Spell Mantle and Finger of Death. Spell Mantle was my first pick because I had nothing else like it and it has helped a bit, but there don't seem to be a whole lot of casters in this campaign. I chose Finger of Death mainly because Delayed Blast Fireball is still weaker than empowered Firebrand and I didn't want much else. I didn't really need Finger of Death yet (Flesh to Stone is the same kind of deal and it affects more stuff), but I did want it eventually.

Now, about damage shield spells: Death Armor, Elemental Shield, and Mestil's Acid Sheath. These spells are powerful and can kill just about anything instantly. My problem with them is that they are too easy and too boring. I almost always take them, but using them always feels cheap. All I have to do is sit there and stuff dies. Boring! I want to be blasting stuff to death! I don't want to just sit there and watch things die from hitting me! This is why I have not taken Mestil's Acid Sheath yet. I will likely take it eventually and replace Lesser Mind Blank once I get Linu's upgraded neckless for Mind Spell Immunity, but for now I don't really feel like using it. That is just my style I guess.

I returned to my sorcerer recently and I finally finished the OC of NWN with her. She finished off at level 19, which I think is a new record high for me on the OC. Morag was a pushover and, once I killed her stupid ritual guardians with a Horrid Wilting and a Negative energy burst or two, I offed her with a single spell: Bigby's Crushing Hand.

This is not the end for my sorceress however. I intend to take her into the epic levels by playing SoU and HotU. For now however, her spells are as follows:

Since I didn't go through my level 8 and 9 choices I will do that now. Horrid Wilting was my first pick at level 8 because of its power and usefulness. Sunburst is kinda special to my strategy as it is one of the only disabling spells that has a reflex save. Its damage vs. undead is nice but I actually picked it more for its blinding effect than that. Premonition is a good spell, but I only want it until I get Epic Warding, at which point I will take Greater Sanctuary, the ultimate emergency spell. For level 9 spells Time Stop seemed like an obvious first choice. My next choice was harder as I debated between Bigby's Crushing Hand and Mordenkainen's Disjunction. I want both eventually (I think), but for now I thought I had gotten this far without dispelling anything so I may as well go all the way without it. The other two choices at this level which tempt me are Black Blade of Disaster and Wail of the Banshee. As powerful as it is I don't think I want Black Blade because, as a summon, it eats XP and I usually need to use it in conjunction with Greater Sanctuary. Wail of the Banshee is nice, but I figure it may be better just to use Finger of Death for my insta-killing.

Just a point that hasn't been mentioned yet. At higher Sorc levels Flame Arrow is a far better choice than other level 3 damage spells simply for removing spell mantles as each arrow counts as a separate spell.

I can't remember how many mind immune creatures are in the OC, but don't ignore confusion. Playing an enchantress with hold person, hold monster, confusion and even the two charms is extremely fun and powerful in a world without immunities on items. Admittedly it is a better way in MP, disabling the enemy for your fellow adventures to dispatch, but still confusion is a great CC opening spell.

Cheeky point: If the shield damage spells are too cheesy/boring for you how does Time Stop not get cut too? Nothing is easier than Time Stop, IGMS, IGMS, rinse and repeat. *Cheeky grin*

Also, don't forget about Sands of Fate on the Vault if you want to take her all the way to lvl40.

Acid Fog: Few things immune to acid, including demons I may add, damage is unsavable, 4d6 + 2d6 per round is somewhat respectable.

Mind Fog: -10 to will saves makes for easy crowd control.

Greater Planar Binding: If you are going through HOTU, you may encounter some outsiders. Who knows if the -5 will save penalty for this spell is encoded or not, but either way no spell resistance makes it useful against powerful single-targets. Also provided a perfectly respectable summon, especially for good alignments, in other situations. Goes well with Mind Fog.

The sorcerer spells I tend to favor in nwn can vary depending on the module or PW I am playing.

On many persistent worlds certain effects are changed/nerfed such as True Seeing . PW's can also be quite large and sprawling, and permanent Haste items are often not available, so I appreciate getting around faster. On such PW's my spell list might look something like this:

As a quick note, this is how my list might end up but there's definitely some temporary picks while leveling such as Shelgarn's Persistent Blade (a good summon for low leveling), Stoneskin/Greater Stoneskin (till I get Premonition), Lesser Missile Stone, Planar Binding (his knockdown is nice), etc.

Another thing worth mentioning is... I really hope NWN:EE fixes the polymorph/shapechange detrimental effects on spellcasters. In the original NWN, if you had any gear that increased your primary casting stat or gave you bonus spell slots, and used Polymorph Self or Shapechange, your spell slots would get jacked because your gear bonuses weren't part of the new forum. On my old PW we fixed this via scripting so casters didn't lose any spells when shapeshifting.

In pnp D&D casters were not arbitrarily penalized for shapeshifting and I don't feel they should be in NWN either. As it stands, its almost never worthwhile for a caster to use these spells due to how punitive they are on your spell slots. If NWN:EE addresses this issue then Polymorph Self and Shapechange become worthy picks.

In modules that use the standard rules, True Seeing is taken in place of one of the other 6th level spells and See invisibility is replaced with something like Bull's Strength for extra carrying capacity.

Another thing worth mentioning is... I really hope NWN:EE fixes the polymorph/shapechange detrimental effects on spellcasters. In the original NWN, if you had any gear that increased your primary casting stat or gave you bonus spell slots, and used Polymorph Self or Shapechange, your spell slots would get jacked because your gear bonuses weren't part of the new forum. On my old PW we fixed this via scripting so casters didn't lose any spells when shapeshifting.

NWN:EE handles this now, spell slots that player loses because of drop in caster ability are unreadied instead of erased. This removes the extreme annoying part of the polymorphing but still makes polymorphing quite disadvantageous. So you might still want to apply your scripting workaround you used for 1.69.

Another thing worth mentioning is... I really hope NWN:EE fixes the polymorph/shapechange detrimental effects on spellcasters. In the original NWN, if you had any gear that increased your primary casting stat or gave you bonus spell slots, and used Polymorph Self or Shapechange, your spell slots would get jacked because your gear bonuses weren't part of the new forum. On my old PW we fixed this via scripting so casters didn't lose any spells when shapeshifting.

NWN:EE handles this now, spell slots that player loses because of drop in caster ability are unreadied instead of erased. This removes the extreme annoying part of the polymorphing but still makes polymorphing quite disadvantageous. So you might still want to apply your scripting workaround you used for 1.69.

Yea I would use my scripts then. It's a shame that they couldn't do something along the lines of the scripts I'm using so that spellcasters don't get jacked by their own spells.

Yea I would use my scripts then. It's a shame that they couldn't do something along the lines of the scripts I'm using so that spellcasters don't get jacked by their own spells.

I hate that too. I set my difficulty to normal so I cant get hurt by my own spells. At the same time, however, I edited the .2da so that I can take critical hits at that difficulty. I would play at hardcore if I could figure out how to disable the PvP at that level.